


(Leave What's) Heavy

by iamfitzwilliamdarcy



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Fire Nation Royal Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:01:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25372066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamfitzwilliamdarcy/pseuds/iamfitzwilliamdarcy
Summary: After a discussion with his uncle on her birthday, Zuko visits Azula for the first time after the war.
Relationships: Azula & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 182





	(Leave What's) Heavy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [catie_writes_things](https://archiveofourown.org/users/catie_writes_things/gifts).



> this started as a quarantine fic for Catie and then I finished it out of spite from Azula discourse on tumblr lmao. Azula/Art Therapy was also inspired by Catie's AU fic Sin & Duty, which is Excellent
> 
> Title taken from Heavy by Birdtalker, which made me really Emo about these two tbqh

“What’s on your mind, Fire Lord?”

Zuko turned from the window he was gazing out of to look at his Uncle, always so proper with titles. Iroh was carrying a tea tray for the two of them, his pai sho set tucked under his arm.

Zuko smiled at him in greeting. “Oh,” he said airily. “Just...things.”

Iroh raised a brow, but didn’t press, only set down the tea tray. 

Zuko sat for their afternoon game, as had become their tradition since he’d taken the throne. Iroh was still his most trusted advisor, but it was good for them to have this time apart from laws and diplomacy and the needs of the people. 

“You are distracted, Lord Zuko,” Iroh said, when he’d won the game. 

“You always win, Uncle,” Zuko pointed out. 

“Not when I am working so hard to let you.”

Zuko blinked at him, mouth falling open just slightly as if he were going to say something but didn’t know what yet. He closed it again and surveyed Iroh. 

“Drink some tea,” his uncle said, warming Zuko’s cup with his fire. “You’ve let yours gone cold, and though you show little concern for what you are served,  _ I  _ am not such an animal.” 

Zuko managed a little, troubled smile as he accepted the cup. He held it to his lips, steam rising to dampen his face, then dropped it, emboldened by the heat. 

“It’s Azula’s birthday,” he admitted. 

Whatever Iroh had expected, Zuko knew by his subtle shift it hadn’t been that. 

“Princess Azula is 15 today,” Iroh said. “I’m sure…”

“I feel as if I’ve abandoned her,” Zuko interrupted. 

“You celebrated your 15th birthday in exile,” Iroh started carefully. “It’s natural that—,”

“She was 11 when I left,” Zuko said abruptly. “And 14 when I exiled her. Ostensibly it’s for her own good but—“]

“You feel it’s vengeance?” Iroh shook his head and added, as if catching up, “You did not exile her."

“If it weren’t, why haven’t I visited her yet?” Zuko demanded. 

“You’ve gone to Ember Island,” Iroh contradicted. “You’ve been….very busy here. It’s not even been a year since the war ended.” 

Zuko waved the absolution away. “I checked her conditions and care were satisfactory. I did not visit  _ her.” _

Zuko stood, his hands folded behind his back as had become habit in his council rooms. His pacing, however, was more agitated than usual. 

“You’re not responsible for Azula’s choices,” Iroh cautioned, watching him intently.

“Aren’t I?” Zuko asked vehemently. “Aren’t  _ you?” _

Silence rang in the wake of the question, and Zuko let out a deep breath after a moment, smoke billowing from his nostrils Drew in another, then out, again and again until there was no more smoke, and finally dropped back to his seat. 

“I am sorry, Uncle, I did not mean—,”

“You are not...necessarily wrong,” Iroh admitted, holding up a hand to halt Zuko. 

“Why did you prefer me?” Zuko asked, nearly immediately. He hadn’t realized it’d been on his mind so long until it was out of his mouth. “Did she remind you too much of Father?”

“No,” Iroh said. “You remind me more of him.”

He looked up sharply at Zuko’s stifled gasp. “I love my brother, Lord Zuko, whatever he is and has done.”

“You visit him still, don’t you,” Zuko asked. 

“Yes,” Iroh said. A small, sad chuckle, “He is almost ready to begin speaking to me again.” 

“You don’t visit Azula,” Zuko pointed out. He blew out a breath of frustration. “I still don’t understand.”

Iroh was quiet a long time, stirring his tea. Zuko watched him patiently, letting his own tea grow cold again. 

“You, my nephew, are a talented musician and a master swordsman. Ozai was also both those things, in addition to being a beautiful dancer, but they were not the talents our father valued,” Iroh began. “He wanted only a strong firebender, a warrior prince. Your father, like you, had to work very hard to improve his skills and meet our father’s standards.”

Iroh sighed and took a sip of the tea. “I was the heir and the more talented of us. You must not think me a brag,” he assured hastily. “It was just true, and just just because I was so much older than Ozai. My father preferred me, even over the child of his old age.” He paused, took a breath, then continued, “It...makes sense that, as the looked-over second-born, Ozai favored his younger child. That she was a prodigy, that he did not see his own perceived weaknesses in her, only made her that more precious in his eyes.” 

Zuko felt a flush rise unbidden to his cheeks, the old hurt he would never be good enough for his father. 

Iroh, gently, patted his hand, “You always held your father in such esteem,” he said, “but you have become the better man.”

Zuko cleared his throat. He did not speak, but wondered,  _ Have I?  _

After a long moment, Iroh drew in a deep breath and continued, “I had lost my son, my father, and my birthright when I returned to court. The birthright I did not care about as much as I ought to have. Certainly, there were feelings of betrayal, but...all that was overshadowed by Lu Ten. And you—“

Iroh’s voice choked, and he paused, collecting himself. He still sounded strangled by emotion when he said, “I did not have my son and you did not have an—an adequate father.”

“I was a replacement,” Zuko said icily. “I have always known that, Uncle. Now I know I was your do-over brother, too.”

“No!” Iroh insisted. “No, you are your own person. It is not--” he stopped, then said, almost thoughtfully, “We just--we needed each other at the same time.” 

“But you never needed Azula,” Zuko said. 

“I swore,” Iroh said, “I would not make my father’s mistakes with my own children. But my second child died in birth with my wife, and I did not realize, when I had the chance, with you and your sister, because you were my brother’s children and not my own, that I was following in his footsteps.” He bowed his head, suddenly looking his old age and not the sprightly man Zuko knew. He looked a wearied war general who had lost too much. “I saw Ozai falling down that path, but did not realize I followed him happily until a better man pointed it out to me.”

“Who?” Zuko asked.

Iroh laughed, just this side of bitter. “You, child. You have far surpassed the legacy handed on to you.” 

Zuko frowned and shook his head. “I am no better if I leave Azula to rot.”

“She is not rotting, nephew,” Iroh insisted. “My failures, your father’s failures, your grandfather’s— they are not yours.”

“They are mine to fix if it’s in my power,” Zuko insisted hotly. “ _ That  _ has always been the legacy left to me. It was left to me to make amends for our Nation, to  _ heal  _ us, and if I abandon my own family--what does that say about me?”

“She tried to kill you,” Iroh said gently, “and tormented you much of your life. It’s okay if you find that hard to forgive.” 

Zuko shook his head. “If Kat—if  _ I _ , who had done so much and wronged so many, can be forgiven, how can I refuse to forgive her?”

Iroh looked at him a long time, until Zuko burst out angrily, “ _ You  _ forgave me! Why is she different?” 

Zuko immediately felt guilty at the immense shame and sadness that clouded Iroh’s face. He squirmed as his uncle, looking suddenly ancient, bowed his head under the weight of his accusations. 

“You won’t find your answers with me,” Iroh told him after a moment to collect himself. “I am an old man who has made many mistakes. With my country, with my brother, with your sister.”

“You did not fail us all,” Zuko protested, trying to undo the effect of his earlier words. “You are a good man!”

“Good men are sometimes very weak,” Iroh told him with a smile. “I led our people in a failed war, I did not protect my wife and children, I let my brother steal my birthright from under me and barely even blinked, and you, Lord Zuko, have laid bare to me all the ways I have failed you and Princess Azula. Let an old man have the benefit of truth and responsibility. Who knows how much longer I will be allowed it?” 

“Many, many moons, Uncle,” Zuko said earnestly. Iroh patted his hand again. “Only you can find the answers you seek. It is not easy, but listen—what do you feel, in your heart? What do the spirits, what does Agni tell you?”

Zuko closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath. He focused on the flame in his heart, the fire that coursed through his veins. He felt troubled, but his fire grounded him. Iroh let him meditate in peace, and when he opened his eyes, he had an answer. 

“I will visit Azula,” he said. “If she will have me.”

****************

Fire Lord Zuko set out to Ember island as soon as the sun broke the horizon the next morning. The sky, bright with oranges and pinks and reds, made him think of his sister. Despite his nerves, the sunrise told him he was doing the right thing.  _ Agni _ told him he was doing the right thing.

He stopped in the village to buy a birthday gift. It was hard to know what Azula might like. A salesman showed him a handmade hair piece. As he pitched it to his Fire Lord—quite a lovely piece, one Katara would have liked, if she styled her hair as a Fire Nation Lady, though hard to say if Mai, who liked so little of Zuko’s taste, would have—Zuko thought that Azula was extremely particular about her hair. Zuko shook his head. Limited female exposure had made him unsure of himself, and he would have liked to run it by Katara at least, or Azula’s friends, if either party still considered the other that. He bought it on impulse and tucked it carefully into his bag before setting off again. 

It was past noon when he finally arrived at Azula’s rooms at Ember Island; he did not allow an announcement about his arrival, but his sister came to greet him. 

“Fire Lord,” the disgraced princess greeted Zuko at the entrance to their old family vacation home. She gave him a bow that only felt partially mocking. That she used his title at all was improvement over the last time he’d seen her. 

“Azula,” Zuko said back, giving her a tentative smile. He noted her hair, though neat and tidy, was far too short for the hair piece he’d gotten. She had shaved it all of, he remembered belatedly, not long after she had been sent to the island. 

She ushered him in, their guards falling in line behind them. 

“I was just making tea when they told me you were coming,” she said. 

They sat, and Azula carefully poured the tea into cups. “I’ve been practicing,” she said, taking a sip of her own, before grimacing. “But I’m not very good.”

Zuko took a sip in solidarity, confiding, “Uncle still won’t allow me to make us tea.”

“Uncle is a fool,” Azula said haughtily, “but he is probably right about that.”

She shook her head, waving off Zuko’s brave attempt to continue drinking, and called to her maidservant to make them a new pot. She bossed, Zuko observed, but her order hadn’t been rude or condescending. Just a request, spoken with authority, of course, but nothing  _ arrogant _ .

“So,” Azula said, behind a new cup of tea, a fresh pot between them, “What brings you here?”

Zuko looked down at his own cup. “I wanted to see you,” he admitted.

She laughed. “Sure,” she said. “What’s the real reason?” 

“Really,” he insisted. “It was your birthday.”

“Did you get me a present?” she asked, sweetly.

“I--,” Zuko started.

She rolled her eyes. “Relax, I was joking.”

“I did, though,” he said, pulling out the hair piece and handing it to her. “But...I don’t know if it’s-- _ good _ .”

“It’s a gift, Zuko,” she said, examining it carefully. She set it, gently, to the side. “Who cares if it’s good?”

He shrugged. Then, serious, he said, “How are you doing here?”   


Her sharp eyes focused on him. She tilted her head to the side, taking another sip of her tea. She was buying herself time, Zuko thought, to consider her answer, to consider how much to give him.

Perhaps, one day, conversations with his family would not be a lesson in strategy. 

“Don’t you already know?” she asked back, finally.

Zuko sighed, frustrated. “You know I get reports, Azula. And you know that’s  _ not  _ what I’m asking.”

“Of course it isn’t,” she said. She was smiling a little behind her cup. “I’m just trying to figure out your interest.” 

“You’re my sister,” Zuko said. 

“Aw, Zuzu,” she crooned. “I didn’t know you cared.”

He frowned at her. “Azula,” he said. “I’m serious. I’m--you know, I’m  _ trying _ here.”

Her own face twisted. “So am I,” she snapped. 

Tension simmered between them, and then Zuko dropped his head into his hands and sighed, breaking it. “I’m no good at this siblings thing,” he said, “but I want us to be better.”

Azula was quiet a long time, looking away. Eventually, she said, still not looking at him, “I’m getting better. My doctors say, at least.”

“That’s--good,” Zuko said, glancing up from his hands. 

She shrugged. “I guess,” she said. Then, “I’m  _ working through  _ things. See, and I always thought it was  _ you  _ who had to work through things, as  _ you  _ were the constant family disappointment.”

Zuko blinked at her, and she flung back her head with an “Ugh!” that sent sparks from her lips. “That was mean. I keep doing that. My doctors say I need to  _ recognize  _ it.” 

“I do work through things,” he admitted quietly, thinking of years away from home and missing his mother and storms that never quite struck right. Of never being enough for his father. And yet, here sat his pride and joy. He almost wanted to laugh—what would Ozai say if he could see them now? 

She laughed, as if for him, though more hysterical than bitter. “You won, Zuko.” She waved her hand in a mock little bow. “You showed us after all.”

“It doesn’t feel like winning, a lot of the time,” he told her. “And I never--,”

“Never what?” she snapped. “Never wanted to be the best? You always wanted that, don’t lie.”

“I’m not lying,” he snapped right back. “I just-- we’re  _ family,  _ Azula, and what’s there left to compete for? Aren’t you tired of it?”

She deflated, leaning back onto her hands. “I wasn’t,” she said quietly, “until I lost.” 

He drew a few breaths in, focusing on the fire in his heart to ground him, then spoke again. “We weren’t how a family’s supposed to be,” he said carefully. He didn’t know how close to touch to subjects that still hurt, that still left him so wounded he didn’t know if he’d ever heal, and this wasn’t something he and Azula had ever discussed. Had they wounded her as much?

He had screamed at a storm to strike him down, and she had been struck down, and was, it seemed, still screaming. Perhaps, they  _ had  _ wounded her then, perhaps just as much, perhaps more.

“Maybe,” she agreed, drawing him away from his thoughts. “But that’s how our family  _ is _ .”

“Yeah,” he said. Then straightened and said, “You said you were trying. I am too. We can fix us.” 

“You sound like our dear old kooky uncle, Zuzu,” she said. “I hope he isn’t your only advisor.”

He opened his mouth to implore her to be serious, but she stood abruptly and said, “Come on, I want to show you something.”

“What is it?” he asked, nervously, standing to follow.

She actually laughed, sounding far more like the sister he knew from Before. “Oh relax, they don’t allow me anything dangerous here. Especially not in such  _ esteemed  _ company.” 

She pushed open a door to a room decorated with plants and littered with notebooks. “I’ve been trying out  _ hobbies _ ,” she told him. 

“You garden?” he asked, skeptically, eyes widening as he took in the room.

“Well, not  _ well _ ,” she said. She poked at a plant nearby that looked brown and withered. “They keep dying.” She let her hand hover it and set the plant on fire until it burned to ash in the pot.

“They tell me the ash makes for good soil for the next plant but,” she shrugged. “That’s the fifth one that’s died this week. I’ve started keeping track.”

She picked up one of the notebooks to show Zuko, where’d she’d drawn a picture of each plant and noted it’s care and how long it lived. 

“That’s a nice drawing,” he told her.

Unexpectedly, she turned and threw the book across the room with a little scream. The pot followed. 

“Azula!” Zuko said alarmed. 

“They  _ all die _ !” she shouted. “It’s because of  _ me _ .”

“Azula,” Zuko repeated, trying to sound calm as she picked up another pot--plant still alive but looking sickly--and hurled it across the room. He waved off the guards that were hurrying in at the sound of commotion. This was between him and his sister. “Azula, who cares if the plants die? It’s just a hobby!”

She didn’t seem to hear him at first, but he braved placing a hand on her arm and she drew in a sharp breath, as if suddenly grounded. 

Her gold-brown eyes were not as sharp and conniving as Zuko knew. In fact, they reminded him of his mother, the fear and urgency softening them the night she’d left. The resemblance was so strong he almost recoiled. 

Azula seemed to sense this and jerked her arm away, backing up a few paces. Her breathing was heavy, like a cornered animal. 

Zuko bent slowly and picked up the sketch book, offering it to her. “Your sketches really are good,” he said. 

“They’re amateurish at best,” she snapped, but she snatched the book away and clutched it to her chest. 

He shrugged. Then, because she didn’t seem in danger of continuing her outburst, ventured, “It’s okay to not be good at plants.”

“You’re not good at anything,” she snarled, as if by reflex. She still wasn’t good at processing her emotions except by lashing out. Defensive to the very end. 

“Not usually,” he agreed easily, instead of letting it hurt like he might have, just a few months ago. “But I work at stuff and get better.”

“Better,” she sneered. “Not good.”

He shrugged a little. “I’ve never been perfect. It took me a long time to be okay with that, but I’m never going to be.”

She looked up at him, eyes unreadable. He felt like he was under examination, but he didn’t know what for. When she didn’t say anything, he said softly, daringly, “He expected too much, from me. And from you.”

She picked up another pot and flung it at his head, but Zuko dodged without flinching. He knew what he was poking into, knew just how bad it could hurt. 

“Do you see him?” She asked finally, sinking to the floor to sit cross-legged. 

“Not really,” Zuko admitted, sitting down across from her. She didn’t seem like she might attack him. “Uncle does though.”

Azula let out a short laugh, then, at his questioning look, explained, “Two older brothers visiting their disappointing siblings. You and Uncle really are the same, such martyrs.”

“You’re not disappointing,” Zuko said. He had never been disappointed in her...only...sad. His uncle’s words from all those years came back to him. Azula had never been given another way to follow, not like Uncle had given him. 

She snorted. 

“You’re not,” he insisted. Then, hesitantly, “Do you want to see him?” 

He wasn’t sure it was a question he  _ should  _ ask--he could never predict her reaction, and what if the doctors said it was too soon--he should’ve brought it up with them first--could Azula really be trusted yet to--

“No,” she said, shortly. 

He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Okay,” he said. 

“It wasn’t him I saw anyway--” she started, then stopped herself abruptly.She drew her knees to her chest, wrapping her arms around them, and rested her head on them, turned away from Zuko. 

After a moment Zuko said, encouragingly, “Saw when?”

She shook her head, muttering, almost bitterly, “You wouldn’t understand. She  _ always  _ loved you.”

“Oh,” Zuko said. He had a hunch about his mother, one he intended to follow, but hadn’t yet. It wasn't time, he didn't think, to include Azula in his plans. Not yet. 

They were quiet while he thought about Ursa, but then Azula spoke, almost aggressive again. 

“ _ You  _ used to be so angry,” she accused. “How did you handle it? They keep telling me I need ways to  _ cope  _ but won’t tell me  _ how _ . It’s like--it’s like they  _ want _ me to fail.”

“They’re not trying to trick you into failing or anything,” Zuko said, exasperated. How could healing even be failing? Then, to answer her question, he admitted, “Uncle made me meditate a lot. That helped...and just having Uncle around.”

“How nice for you,” she said dryly. “I’ve never needed to meditate, and I don’t have anyone like Uncle Kooky around.”

“You have me,” Zuko said earnestly. He held out his hands. “Here, let me show you how to meditate.”

Azula looked at him, brow arched.

“Come on,” he encouraged. “The worst that happens is you feel dumb, and then you can call me a dumb-dumb, if you want.”

“Oh fine,” she said, and plopped her hands in his.

“Just match my breathing,” he said. “We can use actual fire later.”

He closed his eyes and couldn’t see her anymore but her hands relaxed, eventually in his, and her breaths seemed even and controlled. Azula was always  _ controlled _ \-- but now, she seemed...close to relaxed. 

She broke away not ten minutes later. “Well,” she said, loftily, “That’s enough of that.”

Zuko stood and stretched. “Yes,” he agreed. He offered her a hand, and, after a hesitation, she took it, let him help her to her feet. “I think I had better be heading back.”

She nodded, in agreement. “The sun is setting,” she said, as if that meant he’d spent enough time with her. She escorted him to the door and, though she didn’t thank him, she did say good-bye. Zuko bowed to her, courteously, and started out the door. 

“And Zuko?” she said, when he was on the other side of the threshold. 

He paused, and turned back to her. “You didn’t have to lie about the drawings.”

It was his turn to arch an eyebrow. “You know I'm a terrible liar.” He turned back to leave, calling a “Bye, Azula!” over his shoulder.

She was already looking over her notebook, brow knit in concentration.

Perhaps, Zuko thought to himself as he rejoined his guards to return to the city, he’d buy her art supplies as a make-up birthday present. 


End file.
